Container for indian ink drawing devices

ABSTRACT

The specification describes a container for an indian ink instrument with a plate insert arranged in the lower part of the container for vertically holding a nib of the instrument. The nib has its outlet opening extending into a moist air space located underneath the plate insert. The plate insert is provided with a single central mount, which adjoins the air space concentrically surrounding the nib below the insert. The arrangement comprises a porous liquid vehicle surrounding the air space, and a sleeve lid which is adapted to be mounted on the lower part of the container and is adapted to support a shank of the instrument axially and radially.

Unite States Patent [191 Koelichen Jan. 28, 1975 [54] CONTAINER FOR INDIAN INK DRAWING 3,428,380 2/l969 Danjczek 206/l7.l 3,463,323 8/l969 Riepe 2| 1/695 3,696,916 10/1972 Penniman et al. 206/l6.6

Harald Koelichen, Gerctsried, Germany Standardgraph Filler Fiebig GmbH, Geretsried, Germany Filed: Jan. 24, 1973 Appl. No.1 326,535

Inventor:

Assignee:

Foreign Application Priority Data Feb 14, 1972 Germany 2206938 References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 7/1965 Brown, Jr. 220/234 Primary ExaminerWilliam T. Dixson, Jr. Attorney, Agent, or Firm -Ostrolenk, Faber, Gerb & Soffen [57] ABSTRACT The specification describes a container for an indian ink instrument with a plate insert arranged in the lower part of the container for vertically holding a nib of the instrument. The' nib has its outlet opening extending into a moist air space located underneath the plate insert. The plate insert is provided with a single central mount, which adjoins the air space concentrically surrounding the nib below the insert. The arrangement comprises a porous liquid vehicle surrounding the air space, and a sleeve lid which is adapted to be mounted on the lower part of the container and is adapted to support a shank of the instrument axially and radially.

14 Claims, 3 Drawing Figures PATENTEB JAN 2 81975 SHEET 1 [1F 2 CONTAINER FOR INDIAN INK DRAWING DEVICES BACKGROUND OF INVENTION 1. Field to Which Invention Relates The present invention relates to a container for indian ink drawing devices and more particularly to such a container comprising a plate insert arranged in the bottom part of the container for holding the respective writing nib in a vertical position with its outlet opening in a moist, that is to say enriched with moisture, air space arranged underneath the plate.

2. The Prior Art Such containers are intended to avoid drying out of the writing or drawing nib and ensure that each writing nib is immediately ready for use. The danger of drying out occurs more particularly when during drawing or lettering several indian ink drying devices or pens are required with different line breadths and/or different colors. In order to use the various nibs alternately during drawing without the danger of drawing out, previously proposed containers have been provided with a number of mount inserts in order to be able to expose several tips simultaneously to the moist atmosphere. In the case of one prior art storage container of this type, which can be made in any particular shape required and is hermetically sealed, a liquid is provided and above the surface of the liquid an insert with a number of mounts is provided. A sealing plug is provided for the container which has recesses for the shanks of the holders of the drawing devices. Apart from the fact that plugging in and removal of this plug is troublesome and the provision of a hermetic seal is only possible in the case of the insertion of a certain number of holder shanks, the liquid standing in the container leads to disadvantages, because when the container is not placed upright, there is a danger of contact with the nibs and thus of a dilution of the indian ink. Apart from this in the case of insert mounts which are not completely occupied with nibs, there is a danger of drying out. For this reason previously proposed containers were not suitable for long periods of storage of indian ink writing devices.

SUM MARY OF INVENTION One aim of the present invention is to provide a container which avoids the drying out of the nibs and which is simple and compact in construction so that it can be placed comfortably immediately adjacent to the drawing being made and is easy to operate. Furthermore, the container should allow the user or draftsman to see the various indian ink writing devices at a glance.

In order to achieve these and other aims in accordance with the invention in the case of a container of the above-described type there is the feature that the plate insert is provided with a single central hole, which adjoins the air space surrounding the nib concentrically and which for its part is surrounded by a porous liquid vehicle and on the bottom part of the container a sleeve lid can be placed, which supports ashank of'the instrument axially and radially. The invention is based upon the discovery that it is convenient to provide for each indian ink writing or drawing device a separate receiving container of minimum size because in this case it is particularly easy to ensure a hermetic sealing off of the instrument so that it is kept moist. In particular there is the possibility, however, of constructing the storage container at the same time as a sales and packing container so that the customer obtains with each indian ink drawing device that he buys a means which is effective in preventing any drying out of the indian ink. Although there has been a previous proposal to supplement the moisture in the space occupied by a nib by the use of a filling made up of absorbent material, for instance pieces of sponge, which are soaked in water, in this case it is not a question of storage containers but of quiver-like devices, several of which are arranged alongside one another in one container.

In accordance with a particularly convenient and compact construction in accordance with the invention the bottom part of the container is made cubic and the holder of the drawing instrument rests with its nib in the lower part and with its shank within the sleeve lid.

The lower parts of the containers for the indian ink drawing or writing devices required can then be arranged in a convenient and readily apparent array for the draftsman. In order to be able to fix a certain array it is possible in accordance with a further form of the invention to provide the individual container bottom parts with lateral anchoring means and anchoring recesses so that the individual containers can be fixed in any desired mutual arrangement.

A further important feature of the invention resides in that the liquid vehicle in the form of batt or the like has an indicator for indicating the moisture content. The user can then see at a glance whether sufficient moisture is present in the air space or whether he should top up the liquid vehicle with water.

LIST OF SEVERAL VIEWS OF DRAWINGS In what follows an embodiment of the invention will be described with reference to the accompanying drawing.

FIG. I is a plan view of a storage container con structed in accordance with the invention.

FIG. 2 is a section on the line ll-lI in accordance with FIG. 1.

FIG. 3 is a plan view of a number of containers connected together.

DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS The container comprises a generally cubic container bottom part 10 and a comparatively high sleeve lid 12, which can be plugged onto the bottom part 10 of the container. Two adjacent outer walls 14 of the bottom part 10 of the container are provided with two parallel wedges l8 perpendicular to the bottom 16 which have a dovetail cross-section and which are adapted to fit in grooves 22, of corresponding cross-section, provided on the other two walls 20 of a corresponding container. This makes it possible to connect together several container bottom parts in an interlocking manner by introducing one pair of wedges of a container in a. pair of grooves of another container in an interlocking manner so that any number of containers can be connected together in any desired arrangement. Owing to the fact that the grooves and wedges respectively provided on two adjacent walls adjacent to a corner it is possible, as indicated in FIG. 3, to achieve any desired arrangement of containers alongside one another, to form a corner or in several rows or above one another so that the draftsman can provide the arrangement which is most suitable from the optical point of view, that is to say is most easy to inspect at a glance.

In the bottom part of the container a plate insert 24 is press-fitted and its flanges 26 drawn inwards on the outer edge rest on a step 28 on the inner side of the walls 14 and respectively. The plate insert 24 has in the middle a downwardly extending cylindrical mount 30 extending into the interior space of the container, and which is adapted to suit the diameter of the front part 32 of the shank 34 of the drawing instrument so that the shank can rest with its collar 36 of increased diameter against the edge of the mount axially. The nib 38 extends into a cylindrical air space 40 of the bottom part of the container when the shank is inserted into the mount 30, and the outlet opening of the nib is spaced slightly from the bottom 16. The air space 40 is surrounded by a porous liquid vehicle 42 in the form of batt or the like and this batt 42 is impregnated with liquid, more particularly water, so that the air space 40 surrounded by the batt 42'always has a high air moisture content which prevents a drying out of the nib for drawing or writing. Since the plate insert 24 is mounted with a press-fit in a hermetically sealing manner in the lower part 10. of the container and the shank of the instrument fits with its front part 32 precisely into the mount 30 there is an air-tight and moisture-tight sealing action so that the nib can be kept within the container for a long period of time without loosing its ability to write. Moistening of the batt therefore need only be carried out relatively seldom after the moisture has gradually escaped through the mount 30 owing to the instrument being removed in use. In order to make the necessity of moistening apparent to the user the batt which can be fully impregnated with liquid and gradually releases the liquid, is provided with an indicator, whose color change or change in shade indicates the maximum and minimum moisture on visual inspection. Owing to this feature it is possible to indicate that, shortly before drying out occurs, fresh water should be added. On the other hand, owing to the presence of the indicator one avoids the possibility of adding unnecessarily large amounts of water to the lower part of the container, something which could lead to so much liquid accumulating at the bottom of the air space 40 that the nib tube would dip into the liquid.

The sleeve lid 12 is also capable of being mounted on the lower part 10 of the container in a hermetically sealing manner so that even when the shank or drawing instrument is removed drying out is substantially avoided.

The sleeve lid 12 surrounds the instrument shank and supports it and the protective cap 44 of the shank in an axial direction owing to the lid plate 46 and in an radial direction owing to the wall sections 48 which are drawn inwards.

The whole container is preferably made of transparent plastic so that on the one hand the color change of the batt 42 provided with the indicator can be seen through the walls and on the other hand the shank remains visible through the sleeve fit. This is more particularly advantageous when the shank is provided with a color code indicating the line width of the nib or more particularly is colored in accordance with the standardized color code.

The moisture holding container in accordance with the invention is also suitable as a shipping or packing container particularly owing to its compact construction and can be used for selling the indian ink writing instruments.

The invention is not limited to the particular spatial form indicated in the drawing. Departing from the square base surface of the lower part of the container it would be possible to provide lower part parts of the containers in the case of which the lower part of the container would have a cross-section in the form of an n-corner and an n-minus-l-corner (for example a triangle, a hexagon, or an octagon)- Furthermore. it would be possible to use containers with an elliptical or oval cross-section which at positions running together at an angle would be provided with anchoring means or surfaces, for example shoulders. Instead of anchoring shoulders it would be possible to provide wafers of magnetic materials so that their magnetic axes would run horizontally so that two side walls provided with wafers of magnetic material would attract two container bottom parts towards each other. Instead of this it would be possible to provide on one side a wafer of magnetic material and on the other side a plate of soft iron. There is also the possibility of providing a magnet in the bottom plate, with which the container could be fixed to a ferromagnetic, plate or rail on the draftsmans desk.

The advantages of the possibility of combinations indicated in FIG. 3 of the individual containers reside in that various line breadths of the indian ink drawing instruments can be fitted together in accordance with individual habits of the user. If the draftsman buys the units one after the other the latter can be used to form a set since they all belong to the same system and the geometry of the set built up can be selected as desired. The hermetic sealing off of each container (when the shank is inserted, the sleeve lid is not required or when the shank is removed, the sleeve lid itself can be used) drying out is substantially avoided and on transport of the indian ink drawing devices required or holders a selection can be made keeping to the moistening function while at the same time a handy set can be built up which can be easily arranged anywhere.

As can be seen from FIG. 2 the shank or holder shank can be inserted into the container with its protective cap mounted on it and is surrounded by the sleeve lid. During use it may, however, be found convenient to remove the protective cap. In order to avoid loss of this protective cap the plate insert 24 in one corner has an upwardly projecting round shoulder 50 which matches the internal diameter of the cap so that this cap can be placed on it without introduction or removal of the holder shank from the mount 30.

In the lower part of the wedges l8 knob-like projections 52 are arranged on the front side and the grooves 22 have recesses 24 at the same position, into which the projections 52 of another container can snap so that a firm connection of the containers in a vertical direction is possible.

I claim:

1. A container for one ink pen for retaining moisture at the nib of the pen, said container comprising:

an enclosed lower portion; said lower portion having a bottom; a plate defining the upper side of and enclosing said lower portion; an opening through said plate into said lower portion; said opening being sized to support and to be closed by a pen nib inserted therein; said lower portion being of a height such that a pen nib supported by said plate has its inking portion projecting down through said lower portion almost to said bottom; said lower portion having a width sufficient to define an airspace around a pen nib inserted through said plate opening, and a porous liquid carrying means extending around said airspace but not beneath the inserted nib;

sleeve lid for the pen, extending above said container lower portion and being shaped inside said lid to receive the pen inserted in said plate; support means in said lid for engaging the shank of the inserted pen and for supporting same against both axial motion and radial motion.

2. The structure as set forth in claim 1, in which the lower part of the container has a substantially square plan form.

3. The structure as set forth in claim 1, in which the walls of the lower part of the container are provided with means for mutual attachment of containers together.

4. The structure as set forth in claim 3, in which the attachment means comprise anchoring projections and correspondingly constructed anchoring recesses on the container walls.

5. The structure as set forth in claim 4, in which the anchoring projections are provided in two adjacent walls of the container lower part and the anchoring recesses are provided in the two remaining adjacent walls of the lower part of the container.

6. The structure as set forth in claim 5, in which the anchoring projections are constructed as vertically running wedges with a dovetail cross-section and the a'n-.

choring recesses are in the form of grooves with a corresponding dovetail cross-section.

7. The structure as set forth in claim 6, in which the wedges and the grooves are arranged in pairs with the same corner spacing in the walls of the bottom part of the container.

8. The structure as set forth in claim 5, in which the connecting wedges have detent projections which cooperate with corresponding detent recesses within the grooves.

9. The structure as set forth in claim l, in which the sleeve lid and the plate insert can be connected together with the container lower part so as to provide a hermetic seal.

10. The structure as set forth in claim 1, in which said liquid carrying means is absorbent and comprises an indicator for indicating the degree of its moistening.

11. The structure as set forth in claim 10, in which the container is made of transparent plastic material,

12. The structure as set forth in claim 1, provided with a color code which corresponds to the line width of the nib of the indian ink device in it.

13. In combination, the container of claim 1, and a pen:

said pen comprising: a pen nib with inking means,

and a pen shank connected to and supporting said nib;

said nib extending through said opening in said plate into and across said airspace; said pen shank extending up through said container lid and being engaged and supported against both axial and radial motion by said support means.

14. The container structure as set forth in claim 1, wherein said lid is of the relatively greater width of said lower portion over the major portion of the height of said lid, and said lid narrows in cross-section at its said support means, said support means against axial motion of the pen comprises the enclosed end portion of said lid and against radial motion comprises the interior of said lid which is narrowed to the width of the shank of thepen. 

1. A container for one ink pen for retaining moisture at the nib of the pen, said container comprising: an enclosed lower portion; said lower portion having a bottom; a plate defining the upper side of and enclosing said lower portion; an opening through said plate into said lower portion; said opening being sized to support and to be closed by a pen nib inserted therein; said lower portion being of a height such that a pen nib supported by said plate has its inking portion projecting down through said lower portion almost to said bottom; said lower portion having a width sufficient to define an airspace around a pen nib inserted through said plate opening, and a porous liquid carrying means extending around said airspace but not beneath the inserted nib; a sleeve lid for the pen, extending above said container lower portion and being shaped inside said lid to receive the pen inserted in said plate; support means in said lid for engaging the shank of the inserted pen and for supporting same against both axial motion and radial motion.
 2. The structure as set forth in claim 1, in which the lower part of the container has a substantially square plan form.
 3. The structure as set forth in claim 1, in which the walls of the lower part of the container are provided with means for mutual attachment of containers together.
 4. The structure as set forth in claim 3, in which the attachment means comprise anchoring projections and correspondingly constructed anchoring recesses on the container walls.
 5. The structure as set forth in claim 4, in which the anchoring projections are provided in two adjacent walls of the container lower part and the anchoring recesses are providEd in the two remaining adjacent walls of the lower part of the container.
 6. The structure as set forth in claim 5, in which the anchoring projections are constructed as vertically running wedges with a dovetail cross-section and the anchoring recesses are in the form of grooves with a corresponding dovetail cross-section.
 7. The structure as set forth in claim 6, in which the wedges and the grooves are arranged in pairs with the same corner spacing in the walls of the bottom part of the container.
 8. The structure as set forth in claim 5, in which the connecting wedges have detent projections which cooperate with corresponding detent recesses within the grooves.
 9. The structure as set forth in claim 1, in which the sleeve lid and the plate insert can be connected together with the container lower part so as to provide a hermetic seal.
 10. The structure as set forth in claim 1, in which said liquid carrying means is absorbent and comprises an indicator for indicating the degree of its moistening.
 11. The structure as set forth in claim 10, in which the container is made of transparent plastic material.
 12. The structure as set forth in claim 1, provided with a color code which corresponds to the line width of the nib of the indian ink device in it.
 13. In combination, the container of claim 1, and a pen: said pen comprising: a pen nib with inking means, and a pen shank connected to and supporting said nib; said nib extending through said opening in said plate into and across said airspace; said pen shank extending up through said container lid and being engaged and supported against both axial and radial motion by said support means.
 14. The container structure as set forth in claim 1, wherein said lid is of the relatively greater width of said lower portion over the major portion of the height of said lid, and said lid narrows in cross-section at its said support means, said support means against axial motion of the pen comprises the enclosed end portion of said lid and against radial motion comprises the interior of said lid which is narrowed to the width of the shank of the pen. 